Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.5
Audio		3.5
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.5

Dirty Ho Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman December 28, 2021

Note: This film is available on Blu-ray as part of Shawscope Volume One.

If the Shaw Brothers' logo is intentionally reminiscent of the Warner Brothers' logo, there are a number of other connective tethers between the two sets of siblings. The Warners founded what would become one of the "Big Five" studios in the American filmmaking industry in 1923, after having had some success as exhibitors. They went on to create one of the crown jewels of the "studio system" in the United States, eventually matriculating pretty forcefully into the television side of things, even when some of their American competitors were not in such a huge rush to "help the enemy". Somewhat similarly, the Shaw Brothers formed the first version of their moviemaking empire just two years after the Warners, in 1925, though admittedly it took until 1958 for the organization to be called Shaw Brothers. Like the Warners, the Shaws had begun as venue owners, though in their case they dealt in both film exhibitions (courtesy of their father) and live theater. Kind of interestingly, given one of the Warner's technological triumphs, the introduction of sound with 1929's The Jazz Singer, the Shaws are credited with having brought the "talkie" era to Chinese cinema in 1932 and 1933. The Shaws took a while to develop what many think of as their stock in trade, the kung fu films that started appearing in the seventies, but there's little disagreement that their involvement in that genre massively helped to popularize it, much as the Warners had helped to make the so-called "gangster film" must see cinema in the 1930s. Again, understandably somewhat later than the Warners ventured into television in the 1950s, the Shaws ultimately actually forsook the bulk of their movie output to concentrate on productions for the small screen. But Arrow is concentrating on some of the studio's feature films from its perceived heyday, with the Volume One of this set's title hinting that fans may be just at the beginning of an exciting viewing adventure. As is often the case with these deluxe Arrow releases, the packaging is impressive and the supplemental features are bountiful and outstanding.

Dirty Ho may have one of the more unfortunate titles in this set, at least with regard to current day vernacular, but as Tony Rayns helpfully advises, the "Ho" part of the title is probably a misnomer, inaccurately representing how the name is supposed to be pronounced. Ho Jen (Wong Yue) may not exactly be "dirty", but he's a little mischievous, including resorting to a bit of petty larceny now and again. Ho ends up getting involved with Wang Tsun Hsin (Gordon Liu), who is a prince who has gone "undercover" to hopefully expose a plot against him. As Rayns also gets into in his comments on the film, Dirty Ho probably never clearly explicates the whole history of these two characters, leaving parts of the narrative in a kind of nebulous territory, though the upshot is that Wang actually has some ulterior motives to train Ho, though the way he goes about it is unusual, to say the least, and involves first poisoning Ho and then doling out the antidote in small doses in order to keep Ho servile. It's all very strange, and, again as Rayns gets into, may have a slightly homoerotic edge to it.

Dirty Ho is often played for laughs, with the two focal characters mixing about as well as oil and water, and with a prevalence of physical humor stemming from some of Ho's maladroit moves. That said, the film offers good opportunities for several set pieces involving the pair, though even those tend to be played for laughs at times. As the "liner notes" in Arrow's insert booklet point out, one of those set pieces is a deliberate send up of Crippled Avengers.

Dirty Ho Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Dirty Ho is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Arrow Video with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.35:1. Arrow's nicely appointed insert pamphlet sized booklet contains quite a bit of information, though all of the films have been lumped together on one page, as follows:

All twelve films in this boxset are presented in their original 2.35:1 aspect ratios [sic] with their original Mandarin, English and Cantonese (where applicable) monoaural soundtracks. Every effort has been made to present these films in their original and complete versions using the best materials available.

Five Shaolin Masters, Shaolin Temple, Mighty Peking Man, Executioners from Shaolin, Heroes of the East and the shorter Alternate Version of Chinatown Kid were remastered by Celestial Pictures in 2003-2007, as part of an initiative to digitally restore the entire Shaw Brothers library. The High Definition masters of these restorations, which included the original Mandarin and English mono soundtracks, were supplied to Arrow Films by Celestial Pictures.

King Boxer, The Boxer from Shantung, Challenge of the Masters, The Five Venoms, Crippled Avengers, Dirty Ho and the longer international cut of Chinatown Kid have all been newly restored by Arrow Films in 2021, in collaboration with L'Immagine Ritrovata, Hong Kong Film Archive and Celestial Pictures.

The original 35mm negatives for King Boxer, The Boxer from Shantung, Challenge of the Masters, The Five Venoms, Crippled Avengers and Dirty Ho were scanned at L'Immagine Rittrovata Asia and restored in 2K resolution at L'Immagine Ritrovata, Bologna. The Films were graded at R3Store Studios, London. These restorations have used the entire film negative without resorting to the practice of "frame cutting" resulting in the loss of film frames at each negative splice point.

The mono mixes were remastered from the original sound negatives at L'Immagine Ritrovata. Additional sound remastering was completed by Matthew Jarman/Bad Princess Productions. The audio synch will often appear loose against the picture, due to the fact that the dialogue and sound effects were recorded entirely in post production, as per the production standards of the period.

A 35mm internegative of the International Version of Chinatown Kid was scanned at L'Immagine Ritrovata Asia and restored in 2K resolution at L'Immagine Ritrovata, Bologna. The film was graded at R3Store Studios, London.

The mono mix was remastered from the original sound negative at L'Immagine Ritrovata. Additional sound remastering was completed by Matthew Jarman/Bad Princess Productions.

An additional scene from Chinatown Kid missing from the original elements was scanned from a vintage 35mm print and graded in 2K resolution at American Genre Film Archive (AGFA).

All original materials supplied for these restorations were made available from the Hong Kon Film Archive via Celestial Pictures.

Dirty Ho is another film in this set Arrow did for this release with a 2K scan off of the original camera negative. The results are often very enticing, as can perhaps be gleaned from some of the screenshots accompanying this review. Clarity is typically exceptional, supporting really commendable detail levels throughout. The palette is warmly suffused, and both primaries and pastels pop vividly virtually all of the time. Kind of interestingly, there's relatively little of the anamorphic anomalies that can be spotted in some of the other transfers, which may suggest that by this point in the Shaw Brothers' history, they had a better grasp on lenses, or at least a grasp on better lenses. Grain resolves naturally throughout the presentation. My score is 4.75.

Dirty Ho Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Dirty Ho features DTS-HD Master Audio Mono tracks in Mandarin, Cantonese and English. As I did with all the films in this set, I toggled between the three tracks as I watched, and this is another set of audio presentations which tend to be very similar. The English track is once again probably the most relatively anemic, and to my ears the Cantonese had slightly more energy, especially in the midrange, than the Mandarin track, but again, these differences are probably marginal. Dialogue is rendered cleanly and clearly throughout. Optional English subtitles are available.

Dirty Ho Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Arrow has packaged this release with Heroes of the East and Dirty Ho on the same disc. Arrow has rather nicely authored the disc so that when choosing either film, a specific set of supplements is accessible, albeit with some shared content (as with regard to the Rayns piece, below, which is available under both films' Special Features submenus).

• Tony Rayns on Heroes of the East and Dirty Ho (HD; 30:20) is another really informative and enjoyable piece featuring the knowledgeable Rayns.


• Alternate Opening Credits

  Dirty Ho (HD; 3:21)

  
  

  Dirty Avengers (HD; 3:08)

• Trailer Gallery

  HK Theatrical Trailer (HD; 4:04)

  
  

  Digital Reissue Trailer (HD; 1:11)

• Image Gallery (HD)

Note: All of the discs in this set feature some supplemental material that is in 720 rather than 1080, notably some of the trailers.

Dirty Ho Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Dirty Ho brings this first volume of Shaw Brothers films from Arrow to a bombastic close. As Tony Rayns gets into, there are some admitted narrative deficiencies at play in the film, but the two stars are well matched, and the relentless shtick is agreeable and at least occasionally hilarious. Technical merits are solid, and as usual with Arrow's releases, the supplements very enjoyable. Recommended.